Review Blog

May 04 2016

Beyond magenta: transgender kids speak out by Susan Kuklin

Candlewick Press, 2014. ISBN 9780763673680
(Age: 12+) Recommended. LGBT, Transgender, Bullying, Coming out,
Families. Interviews with six transgender and gender neutral teens
are presented in this handsomely produced, well illustrated book. I
found it most enlightening about some kids in our world who do not
feel comfortable with the role given them at birth and so do
something about it. Their bravery shines through as they go through
the steps of changing or at least adapting themselves, some through
surgery, others through drugs. Their bravery in taking these steps
is doubly impressive in allowing their stories to be told, along
with series of photographs which show their transformations. These
will create interest but it is the stories of these young people
that will captivate the reader.
All felt from an early age that they were not like others, and this
often meant they were different at school, leading to exclusion and
bullying from the rest of their cohort. Christina, in the second
story tells of how she was always picked last for a team, how at her
Catholic boy's school, she was teased and as a result told others
that she was gay, not transgender. Even as an adult she has been
picked out for derision by people who question her looks. She is
saving for a vagina.
Mariah in the third story, the child of an Italian migrant whom she
has never seen and a Black woman, was raised by her grandmother.
Going to kindergarten and school raised people's ire from the start,
as she only dressed as a girl. This resulted in unwelcome attention
from government agencies and she was taken from her family and
placed in care. Several placements later she developed problems
which required medication but after her mother died she tried to
stop. A placement in Philadelphia saw her being able to talk to a
supportive therapist and for the first time was able to write down
what she felt. With hormone therapy she was able to stop the male
growth spurt when she turned sixteen and is now working out how to
tell people about what she is.
Cameron the boy on the front cover tells his story next. He is
transgender and takes testosterone, but revels in his male and
femaleness. He discusses the whole issue of sexuality and gender
from his perspective, concluding that life is an adventure that he
is part of.
Each story is different and yet has similar characteristics. Each
teen feels different from a young age and struggles to cope with how
society sees them, including their parents. Each takes medication to
help, but each story is also quite different in how people and
family have reacted and certainly in how they feel in themselves.
Cameron is cool abut his sexuality from the start, whereas Christina
still goes through anxiety, and Mariah feels that she is at the
beginning of her transition, and wants to help out other people in
the same situation by telling her story.
A range of labels: trans, nonbinary, intersexual, transsexual, pan
sexual, gender neutral, gay and queer used help underline the need
some have for a label, but above all else, these kids need to be
labelled brave, and treated just as everyone else, kids coming to
terms with their sexuality.
Fran Knight